Whitehall secure £6bn hardware and apps deals

Seeks further economies of scale in procurement

By Leo King

July 30, 2009

IDG News Service

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The government is looking for up to 15 suppliers for £6 billion worth of IT hardware and desktop applications.

The kit will be used across Whitehall, according to the contract notice placed by OGCbuyingsolutions on Tuesday. It will be purchased for offices in the UK, as well as sites abroad including military bases.

NHS organisations and local government sites will also be able to procure goods through the framework, alongside national businesses such as Royal Mail, Ordnance Survey and the Met Office.

The new frameworks will cover PCs and related peripherals, as well as servers, network routers and storage devices. The deals will be split into three lots: desktop hardware, infrastructure hardware, and software.

Services deals will also be signed as part of the frameworks. The desktop and infrastructure hardware frameworks will include maintenance, installation and training services, and the software contracts will include installation and testing.

The deals will run for three and a half years, with an option to extend the period for another six months. The government expects suppliers to include large companies as well as smaller firms and niche specialists. Providers have until 28 August to submit their offers.

“Buying Solutions is putting in place a pan-government collaborative framework agreement for use by UK public sector bodies including but not limited to central government departments and their agencies, non-departmental public bodies, NHS bodies and local authorities,” OGCbuying solutions wrote in the contract notice.

The move is the latest government step to use economies of scale to save money on procurement. A week ago Westminster placed a similar framework notice for communications and network technology.

Systems covered in that framework include telephony and unified communications kit and infrastructure, RFID equipment and services, satellite equipment, and telecoms business continuity and project management.